Moonstone

by Olivia Stocum

  She winced, then looked up from under burgundy lashes, candlelight flickering her face. “My love,” she moaned theatrically. “This may be the last time I ever see you.” Her brows lifted. From the confines of her cloak flashed a knife. She pressed it into his hand and William worked it up his sleeve.

  A guard dragged Rhiannon away, this time by her upper arm. Her face twisted in pain and she cradled her broken forearm against her middle. William tensed, then forced himself to shut down emotionally. If he didn’t, he would slip again, and it would cost them everything.

  William glanced at Connor. The man lifted his brows and slid the hilt of a knife out of his sleeve. Alice’s?

  “Come now, my dove,” Geoffrey said.

  Rhiannon shook her head. Geoffrey wrapped his long fingers around her injured arm and she gasped in pain.

  “I said, come!”

  Rhiannon walked with him.

  Geoffrey prodded Reginald toward a bench. “Sit,” he said, using the same tone one might use on a dog. Reginald complied and Geoffrey angled his dagger toward Rhiannon. She tried to back away, but he still had her by her broken arm. Careless with his dagger, Geoffrey nicked Rhiannon. Dark red stained her gown, spreading into a flat, wet circle.

  She would go into shock soon if this kept up.

  Geoffrey dragged her toward a small table near the altar. He picked up the quill and dipped it into a bottle of ink, then scratched his name onto the marriage contract. “Now you,” he said.

  She looked at William as if asking him what she should do. He nodded.

  With shaky fingers she signed her name.

  “See how quickly you learn.” Geoffrey led her before the minister. “Begin.”

  “Kneel please.” The minister’s lined face was bland, as if he saw nothing unusual about a wedding at dagger point.

  “Wait,” Rhiannon said.

  “No waiting, dove.”

  “My maid. I’ll not fight you, but I want my maid.”

  Geoffrey turned and gestured. “Bring the girl.”

  Alice was released and she ran to Rhiannon’s side.

  “Now begin!” Geoffrey turned to the minister.

  The man cleared his throat and spoke.

  While William considered how he might disarm the guard behind him, Rhiannon looked over her shoulder and lifted her brows. He didn’t know what she was trying to tell him. Her jaw tightened with frustration. Then she dropped her gaze and looked up from under her lashes, blinking in a come-hither look that would have floored him.

  If she weren’t being force to marry another man.

  And there hadn’t been a sword at his back.

  He nodded.

  “Rhiannon.” William pulled forward in a lurch, stumbling toward her and falling to his knees. He caught the hem of her cloak. “How will I live without you?”

  “Och, do shut up,” Geoffrey said, his dagger swiveling off Rhiannon.

  William drew the knife from his sleeve. Geoffrey engaged with a sloppy arc and William’s blade slid like pudding into Geoffrey’s side.

  Geoffrey’s eyes glazed over. His hands curled around the blade just under his bottom right rib. Dark blood ebbed through his doublet and over his fingers. He wavered, then fell to his knees and collapsed to the floor.

  Steel glinted as Connor disarmed a guard and tossed the man’s sword at Angus. William turned to see his own claymore angling down on him. He caught the man’s wrist and twisted until he dropped the sword, then kneed him in the gut. William retrieved his sword and knocked him unconscious with the hilt over the back of his head.

  He looked for Rhiannon. She was standing over Geoffrey. “Rot,” she said, and spat at his face. William stepped over Geoffrey and pushed her behind him, fighting off two more men.

  Silence hovered after the echo of steel faded. Geoffrey’s men lay draped over benches or prone on the floor. Blood splattered stone and wood. Connor wiped blood off Alice’s face with his sleeve, his expression turning from fierce to tender as he looked her over.

  “’Tis not hers,” Connor said, sounding relieved.

  Rhiannon wavered on her feet and William looped his arm around her waist as she collapsed against him. He sheathed his sword and swept her slender body into his arms. His shoulder felt as if he were being stabbed with a hot poker. Blood still ran down his arm, but he bit past the pain. Rhiannon’s eyes were half-closed and lacking of any coherency. She’d passed out.

  Reginald stood on shaky legs and gazed around the sanctuary.

  “I am not done with you,” William said.

  Connor grinned and dragged Reginald by the back of his tailored doublet. He shoved him toward the table by the altar.

  “Now scratch out Geoffrey’s name,” William said. Reginald hesitated and Connor gave him another shove.

  The man dipped the quill in ink and scratched out Geoffrey’s name.

  “Now initial it.”

  He did as he was told. Connor dragged him back to his bench and pushed him onto it. William jostled Rhiannon in his arms in an effort to free his hand. Angus put the quill into his fingers, then lifted the parchment to him.

  “Thank you,” William said.

  Angus smiled. “Ye are most welcome, my laird.”

  William signed his name and Connor scattered sand over the page to dry it, then rolled the parchment and took it with him.

  “I’ll just keep this safe for you, my laird,” Connor said.

  William carried Rhiannon to the altar and looked up at the minister. “I suggest you do this with haste.”

  The minister smiled without emotion. Blood speckled the front of his robes. “I am afraid I canna perform the ceremony whilst the bride is unconscious.”

  Daggers, blood, and mayhem were a nonissue, but heaven forbid the bride should be unconscious. “Connor,” William said.

  Connor drew his claymore and pointed it at the impassive minister. “I am thinkin’ ye can.”

  The man straightened, his face tight. “Och, aye, I believe . . . I can.” He mumbled the words of the marriage rites, then eyed Rhiannon when it was time for her to answer.

  Alice stepped in. “Proxy, my laird,” she said.

  William nodded and Alice answered for her lady in her stead.

  As the minister finished, Geoffrey groaned and rolled onto his back. His eyes were blank, and his bloody wound such that he might, or might not live.

  “My laird?” Connor asked.

  William took a long breath, let it out. “Leave him in God’s hands. ’Tis time to go.”

  He wanted to see to Rhiannon’s wounds, but there wasn’t time. William determined that her cut was only a flesh wound. Alice tore a strip of cloth off her petticoat and wrapped it around Rhiannon’s middle to staunch the bleeding.

  “Take me with you,” Reginald said. “You promised me safe passage.”

  William turned, glaring at him. “You canna be serious.”

  The man took a step back, glancing at Geoffrey lying on the floor in a pool of blood. “They will know I betrayed him. I will not survive if you do not help me.”

  William felt Rhiannon’s hipbone pressing into his stomach more acutely than before, saw the ridges of her breastbone and her bruised skin.

  He turned and left Reginald behind, his pleas for mercy fading as William left the Kirk with Rhiannon.

  “A gift, my laird,” Angus said outside. He held the reins to Geoffrey’s prized stallion.

  “Might as well,” Connor said. “Where he’s going, he willna need a horse.”

  William shifted Rhiannon into Connor’s arms so that he could mount the tall dapple-gray. Connor passed her up to him. Her head lolled on his shoulder, and William checked the pulse at her neck. It was strong, so he decided it was best to leave her be. She needed the reprieve.

  “Move out,” he told his men.

  Chapter Seven

  Rhiannon came reluctantly awake. Alice had her arms wrapped around her. She couldn’t tell if Alice sought to give her comfort, or to hold her d
own.

  Perhaps a bit of both.

  Rhiannon forced her blurry vision into focus. She’d been in and out of consciousness all night, and now she lay in the heath under a cloudy sky. The air was cool, moist, and it held the fresh smell of morning.

  Then she smelled leather and spice, and knew he was near.

  William sat down next to her. She winced when he stretched her injured arm over his bare knee. Her face heated and she realized why Highlanders were considered less civilized than their English neighbors. Their preferred method of dress did naught to improve their reputations. He examined the bones in her arm, his warmth radiating from the solid muscle of his leg. The chilled, frighteningly vulnerable part of Rhiannon wanted to shift closer to him, gravitating into his body heat and his protection. The rest of her screamed, nay!

  William worked his way over the tenderest part of her arm and she whimpered.

  His eyes closed in concentration, his brows drawing closer. Then he released her. “Connor,” he said. “I will need you to hold her down while I set the bone.”

  Rhiannon tried to sit up. Her side pulled, and she looked down to see a strip of cloth that matched Alice’s petticoat wrapped around her middle.

  “Was I stabbed?” she asked.

  “You dinna remember?”

  “I remember very little.”

  “Probably just as well. It is a flesh wound only,” William said. “Right now I need to set your arm.” He ran his thumb over her forearm, just above her wrist. “’Tis a clean break. I can set it easily.”

  “Easy, like when you stitched my lip?”

  He cringed. “Quickly. I can set it quickly. Will you drink something first?”

  “Please do, my lady,” Alice said.

  Worry creased Alice’s youthful eyes. Rhiannon nodded. “I will, for you.”

  Connor produced a metal flask, and William held it to her lips while Alice propped her up. Rhiannon drank hard spirits only when she had no other choice, and had little tolerance for them. She took a cautious sip. When the fluid hit her mouth it made her split lip burn and her throat constrict. The single sip fired out of her mouth, splattering across the front of William’s shirt.

  She pushed the flask away, embarrassed. “I cannot.”

  William cursed in Gaelic. Rhiannon instinctively shifted away from him. He met her gaze, and then gently dabbed her chin with the hem of his sleeve, his knee brushing against her leg.

  “I’m not mad at you,” he whispered.

  Rhiannon wasn’t convinced.

  William stood, speaking with Connor, who then jogged off with the flask in his hand. Rhiannon leaned back against Alice. “Where are we?”

  “North, I would think.” Alice blinked at the overcast sky. “The wilderness.”

  William returned, brushing her hair from her forehead, his fingers lingering, making her wonder if he was checking her for a fever.

  “We’re on the moor,” he said to them. “We rode all night.”

  Rhiannon struggled to recall the events of the night before, but they were a blur. “Geoffrey?”

  “Let’s just say that you no longer need to concern yourself with him.” William’s jaw ticked.

  “Is he . . .”

  “I dinna know. We did not remain long enough to find out, but he probably is.”

  She swallowed. “And Reginald?”

  William’s gaze shifted to Alice, then back to Rhiannon, his gray eyes stormy. “You will never see him again.”

  “He’s dead?” She wasn’t sure if she should feel grateful or not. Was it wrong to wish death upon the man who had her parents killed?

  “He might be.”

  “But you said-”

  William’s sigh cut her short. He looked at Alice. “Go help Connor.”

  Alice slid from under her shoulders and William took her place. He adjusted Rhiannon into him so that she sat propped against his chest.

  “Reginald is no longer your guardian,” he said.

  “W-what did I miss.”

  “Dinna be angry.”

  She looked up at him. “Why would you say that, unless I had a good reason to be angry?”

  He rubbed his jaw. She swore she felt even more heat rising off his body. His neck looked red from it.

  “William!”

  He stiffened. “I had to.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Alice stood in proxy, seeing as you were unconscious.”

  Proxy? Rhiannon froze.

  “Breathe,” he said.

  She filled her lungs, stars dancing around the edges of her vision. “You married me whilst I was unconscious?”

  “I had no choice.” His eyes were dark, his face set in firm lines.

  “Were you forced at the end of a pistol?”

  “Something much more powerful.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Never mind.”

  She wasn’t ready to be anyone’s wife. Rhiannon wiggled against him. “Let me go.”

  “Nay.”

  “Let me go.”

  He bent his mouth to her ear, his heavy hair brushing her face. “Stop.”

  Connor and Alice returned, Connor holding a wooden mug. Alice looked at the ground, twisting her skirt.

  “How could you?” Rhiannon asked.

  Alice let her hands drop to her sides. Her face softened and her eyes flicked toward William. “Since the moment I saw him carry you into your chamber, I have prayed that he would free you from your cousin and Laird Geoffrey. I am sworn, by fealty, and friendship, to take the very best care of you I can. And I believe this is for the best.”

  Rhiannon found it hard to argue with Alice. She looked at William. Her husband! His Adam’s apple rose and fell as he swallowed. Then he looked at her. And it was as if she could see her future in his eyes.

  She couldn’t separate her days from his.

  Alice pushed the mug to her mouth and she drank. The spirits were sweet now, syrupy. They’d mixed it with honey like one might do for a child. She was humiliated, but she swallowed it all down.

  “Give it a minute,” William said.

  She nodded. Her feet felt warm. William dismissed Connor and Alice with a wave of his hand.

  “I thought you wanted him to hold me down.”

  “I will do it.”

  “And set my arm at the same time?”

  “Aye.”

  William readjusted her against him. She was a rag doll in his arms. Warmth spread into her hands and her head began to buzz. She realized he’d positioned himself so that she was sitting between his legs with her back against his chest, and there wasn’t anything her heavy limbs could do about it.

  Blasted spirits.

  His warm, calloused fingers slid down her arm, finding the break. William rubbed the inside of her wrist with his thumb, the sensation further numbing her brain. His other arm was around her waist, holding her against his chest.

  With a hard pressing movement he forced the bones back into place. Rhiannon screamed. Pain ricocheted through her body and her vision dimmed and starred, then widened back to normal.

  He apologized to her in Gaelic, turning her into his chest. She cried and buried her face in his hair, the dark strands sticking to her wet cheeks. It was several minutes before her sobs began to quiet. Hiccups followed, making her side ache. She began to hate herself for loosing composure.

  William accepted a strip of cloth from Connor and wrapped her arm with it. Then he bound it against her rib cage in a sling. She hiccupped.

  He sighed and scrubbed his face with his hand. Alice and Connor were dismissed again, this time with an order to keep the men away. Rhiannon eyed him, half-coherent, as William slid out from behind her, laying her gently back into the heath. The thick matted plants were warm where they’d absorbed his body heat.

  “Why did you send them all away?” she asked.

  “Because I need to clean and properly bind your side, and I dinna want anyone looking at my wife.”

>   “William?”

  “Aye.” He removed the makeshift bandage. She heard fabric tear. Her gown. He was tearing her only gown. His fingers probed her side. Rhiannon shifted away.

  “Dinna move.” He pulled his knife from his boot.

  “What are you doing?”

  He scowled, and she was ashamed of herself. He hadn’t hurt her yet. Why would he start now?

  “I didn’t mean that I thought you would use it on me.”

  William grunted an acknowledgment and rolled her onto her uninjured side. A moment later the ties on her under-bodice released with a twang. She took a deep, unrestricted breath. His fingers worked the garment out from under her gown and he tossed it aside.

  “You can’t do that.” She tried to sit up, but her head was swimming.

  He laid her back down, then peeled her hair off her face. “You dinna need your stays.”

  She looked away, her cheeks burning. “I cannot believe you just did that.”

  Rhiannon moved away when he touched her stomach.

  “Och, Rhiannon, I canna do this if you willna lie still.”

  His brogue had thickened, and she needed to think about his words before she could understand them.

  “Alice can do this,” she said.

  “She could, aye. But I willna let her.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I . . .” His mouth formed the next word, but he didn’t say it.

  She thought for one mind-numbing moment that he was about to tell her it was because he loved her.

  But it was a daft thought, anyway.

  “Just lie still,” he finished. His voice was edged, but at least his hands were tender.

  Rhiannon bit the inside of her cheek while he cleaned her cut and dressed it. She looked down when he was finished and saw the tear in her gown hidden under a fresh bandage.

  “This is my only gown.”

  “’Twas too late for it.”

  “And my, my . . .”

  “Breathing is more important than social constraints.”

  She blew out a breath.

  “See.” He lifted his brows, then tucked her back into his arms before she had a chance to protest. “I want you to drink some wine, then we will ride again.”

  “Will you give me any choice in the matter?”